"I wasn't born and raised to be a Kyoto geisha... I'm a fisherman's daughter from a little town called Yoroido on the Sea of Japan." Beginning in a poor fishing village in 1929, Memoirs of a Geisha chronicles the life of nine-year-old Chiyo, born with blue-gray eyes, and sold with her sister into the slave life of being a geisha after her mother's death. Lost in this new world where a girls virginity is sold to the highest bidder, Chiyo works as a servant in the okiya of Hatsumomo until she is taken under of wing of Hatsumomo's archenemy Mameha, another powerful and beautiful geisha in another okiya. After years of endless drama, extensive schooling on entertaining men, ducking Hatsumomo's wrath, and losing a best friend, Chiyo becomes Sayuri, one of the most successful geisha ever... only to lose it all again.

The first time Arthur Golden's Memoirs of a Geisha came to my attention was when I saw the cover of the book and a brief description in Cosmopolitan magazine two years ago.

A geiko entertaining a guest in Gion (Kyoto)

English: Fushimi Inari shrine

Memoirs of a Geisha

Although I was interested in the novel, I was hesitant to read it because I don't generally like books with cultural and romantic references, however, from page one I knew that I was in for the long haul. Written like a work of poetry, Memoirs of a Geisha carries the reader through a complete range of emotions, the novel is a ride over the highest hills and mountains and back down again. What I found most intriguing was that this book is actually written by a man, but really explores the life, emotions, and trials of a woman so accurately and fully. It is hard to believe that a man could write a novel so deep and moving. Golden employed none of the literary...

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Memoirs of a Geisha, by Arthur Golden, is distorted version of the classic story of Cinderella. A young girl who grows up with a hard life, struggles to make ends meet, and whom one day hopes to find true love. One day, she meets "˜prince charming', they fall madly in love, and live happily ever ...

... Memoirs of a Geisha" by Arthur Golden, is a beautifully written epic tale which envelopes the reader instantly; revealing Golden's ability to include a realism inside an engrossing, yet fictional narrative, resulting in the novel becoming a bestseller enjoyed the world over. Through his use of ...

... life with. It's a story about the days of decadence before World War II, and the hardships that followed. "Memoirs of a Geisha" provides a compelling story to serve as a backdrop to relate the historical facts of a geisha's day-to-day life in the 1930's and 1940's. The sense of ...

... life is said to succeed in the future. In Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden, Chiyo (later referred to as Sayuri) endures many obstacles to attract the Chairmans attention, become a successful geisha and to outrun her enemy, Hatsumomo. At first, she starts off her new life as a maid who tries to ...

... than the Life of Pi , I would also recommend Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden for the "freshmen text." I would recommend Memoirs of a Geisha to anyone looking to learn more about a culture alien to most of us, and enjoy reading a totally realistic story. It's about the life of a Japanese geisha ...

3 pages24Apr/20063.0

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